Meat eating vegetarian?

[Wabi-sabi]

May seem like a silly question but I have always wondered.

If you are a vegetarian because you do not believe it is right to kill an animal, is it okay to eat meat if the animal died of natural causes? Say a cow froze to death and is disease free. Can you eat it?

[Matt]

I'd imagine it would be up to the individual. Most vegetarians/vegans I know find meat repulsive, regardless where it came from.

[Zach]

I don't eat meat because I don't like it..I don't like the taste of it, I don't like the thought of eating flesh (muscles, fat, skin on chicken), etc. I don't like having to lick a bone every time I eat buffalo wings. It makes me sick.

Also, I'm not too fond of the methods used to kill animals, and I don't like the thought of raising animals solely for food. I also don't like the economic waste created by growing food for cows instead of food for us.

To put it simple, I just don't like it.

[Lotus]

Originally Posted by Wabi-sabi

May seem like a silly question but I have always wondered.

If you are a vegetarian because you do not believe it is right to kill an animal, is it okay to eat meat if the animal died of natural causes? Say a cow froze to death and is disease free. Can you eat it?

In this case... probably yes, if you consent that it is okay to eat people who died of natural causes. You don't actually have to eat anybody, you just need to be okay with the eating of anyone.

In some cultures (these are rare, and I can only think of one that is still around, but members who eat brain are at risk of developing a prion disease) the dead were eaten (especially heart and brain) in order to let the "spirit" live on inside the living. (Very Heinlein Stranger in a Strange Land).

Now, silly question, but I'm wondering... do you eat meat? Usually only omnivores pose these types of very silly hypothetical questions.

Generally speaking, when you give up eating flesh for moral reasons, the thought of eating meat starts to get a bit repulsive. I couldn't go back to omni if I wanted to (I don't want to), because my body just doesn't want it.

[Lucas]

I wouldn't because I can't really digest meat...the less I eat it, the less I even want to. Eggs are getting hardr and harder to eat too.

[Andrew Brunelle]

This reminds me of a quote from on of the episodes of the Simpsons, where Lisa asks if anything at Homer's barbeque hasn't been brutally slaughtered, and he says, "Maybe the veal died of lonliness." I'm fine with eating small quantities of meat, but I try to get it from sources that use free-range animals and don't use antibiotics or other terrible practices, like rBGH growth hormone. I think if the animal has a pretty good life up until it's slaughtered and is in good health, in moderation, and I stress moderation, it should be okay to consume. I just don't want to eat an animal who had to be fed antibiotics because it would have died otherwise from the awful conditions in the factory farms.

[Stephen]

Originally Posted by Wabi-sabi

May seem like a silly question but I have always wondered.

If you are a vegetarian because you do not believe it is right to kill an animal, is it okay to eat meat if the animal died of natural causes? Say a cow froze to death and is disease free. Can you eat it?

HI wabi

As in roadkill? Well the problem is for ethical vegans, that consuming even roadkill, means that you consider animals are less worthy of rights than humans.

Now this may seem strange to people but many vegans like the Philosphers Peter Singer and Tom Regan, the other species as far as possible should be treated when possible with the courtesy and respect that we afford humans. Therefore if we wouldnt eat a human that has been knocked down, then we shouldnt eat animals that are roadkilled.

When we allow varying degrees of 'Animal Farm Politics' to enter our ethics then we will find ourselves on a slippery slope. In fact the other end of the slope is the excuse.."Well this animal was already killed and wrapped for the supermarket, so it doesnt make any difference whether I eat it or not, its already dead."

The fact is that 99.99% of Vegans who have been meat free for any length of time would probably be violently sick if dead animal flesh went anywhere near them. The very though of it turns my stomach.

Good question though!

[Athena]

This is so wrong:

"Well this animal was already killed and wrapped for the supermarket, so it doesnt make any difference whether I eat it or not, its already dead."


I hope no omnivores here use that faulty reasoning! Understand that your buying that meat means another animal will be killed to fill that space on the shelf. Buying it is pretty much killing it, with a long arm, but your hands are still bloody!

==

Also, as for the first scenario you posted-- it looks like vegans and vegetarians come with their own layers of reasoning for why they don't eat meat. Understanding the ethics of killing is great and all, but I think the most important layer is that of our own HEALTH. Eating that dead cow is, most of all, unhealthy for our bodies.

Another layer is the spiritual layer-- those that are opening up spiritually can see that our minds are less clear when we carry dead animals in our bodies.

And vegetables are a lot yummier anyways!

[Qilfish]

Actually, setting aside the social effects and whatnot, if I found a human like this, and I was sure that it wuld do no harm to others, them or me (like to their family or whatever) I wouldn't mind eating them just to see what it's like. If I found a cow or something, I probably wouldn't because I don't like meat, but maybe, for the sake of not being wasteful, I'd cook it for one of my friends.

Although, supposedly, if this did happen, yud have to take it home and skin it and butcher it, which wouldn't be very pleasant, so I'd probably end up leaving it.